Convoy attacked in DRC's Virunga National Park

Virunga National Park - Some tourists were kidnapped and a convoy attacked in the Virunga National Park, the Democratic Republic of Congo's famed haven for gorillas and other endangered species, a park source said.

The source did not specify the nationality of those abducted but said their guard was seriously injured. A local journalist also tweeted about the kidnapping.

"I confirm an attack on our convoy," Joel Wengamulay, the park spokesman told AFP, without specifying if tourists were targetted or had been kidnapped.

On April 9, five rangers and a driver were killed in an ambush in the park, which was established in 1925.

One of the most important conservation sites in the world, it covers 7,800 square kilometres (3,011 miles), or three times the size of Luxembourg, along a swathe of eastern DR Congo abutting the border with Uganda and Rwanda.

Virunga is home to about a quarter of the world's population of critically-endangered mountain gorillas, as well as to eastern lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, okapis, lions, elephants and hippos.

But it is located in DR Congo's North Kivu province, where armed groups are fighting for control of territorial and natural resources, and poaching is a major threat.